Today is my dad's 65th birthday. He always loved visiting Arizona over the years, he finally made his dream come true by moving to Tucson. My dad has always lived a very healthy lifestyle -- I believe that is why is he in such good physical and mental shape today.

One year before I was diagnosed with breast cancer we ran the 5k at the Susan G. Koman Race for the Cure in Philadelphia. That was back in 2000, however my dad has been running in races for over thirty years. We also tackled the Avon 2 Day walk in New York City in the fall of 2003.

Jack is a non-smoker, a jogger, hiker, a golfer, and a chess player -- it is important to not only exercise the body -- but also the mind.

Keep it up dad. Happy birthday!! I love you!

John Ondrasik, the man and musician behind the band Five for Fighting, has released a new album and a new website that just happens to benefit the Breast Cancer 3-Day, a 3-day, 60-mile walk sponsored by Susan G. Komen For the Cure.

Think about this:

Ondrasik's new album, "Two Lights," features a song called "World" which is in heavy rotation on pop radio stations across the country. This single is the inspiration for Ondrasik's new website, What Kind of World Do You Want -- the first video community that gives back by allowing visitors a chance to make a difference.

This is how it works: reveal what kind of world you want and help raise money for charity by watching videos or creating and uploading a video of yourself, your friends, or your family. In your video, answer the question What Kind of World Do You Want? and then choose which charity you wish to help fund.

In addition to the Breast Cancer 3-Day, selected charities include the Fisher House, Save the Children, Autism Speaks, VH1 Save the Music Foundation, and NY Police and Fire Widows & Children. Video clips describing each charity, a message from Ondrasik, and a video of the song "World," are all featured on the site.

Today I offer you not so much a Thought for the Day but a Question for the Day. Before I ask my pressing question, though, I want you to consider this story.

Diagnosed with a rare malignant melanoma on her retina in 2001, Ann Guthrie, a South Carolina wife and mother of two grown sons, endured radiation and chemotherapy. The treatments shrunk Guthrie's tumor, but another mass appeared two years later, forcing the removal of her right eye.

At about the same time Guthrie lost her eye, cancer was discovered in her lungs. It was inoperable. Then cancer landed in her brain. And now, without any approved treatment avenues, Guthrie is out of options.

Like many people with terminal illnesses, this woman is willing to try just about anything -- a clinical trial, experimental drugs, risky treatments -- to extend her life. If she's going to die anyway, why not? She just might live longer. And if she doesn't, she could at least help advance science by offering herself up as a sort of guinea pig.

While the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has proposed changes that would make it easier for patients to access options like these, it's just not that simple right now.

There are ethical issues -- like weighing the needs of people who think anything is better than death against the need of society to prove drugs and treatments work safely. The only way to ensure a sort of balance is through clinical trials -- and letting anyone participate in clinical trials, for example, would make the results harder to interpret.

And there are medical and legal risks. What if terminally ill patients end up in worse shape after a treatment with an experimental drug, for example? What if the FDA or a physician is considered responsible for adverse drug reactions?

Denying terminal patients their last bits of hope is difficult. "It's a hard discussion to have with a patient and his family," says one doctor. "There's a lot of tears. We all would love to be able to get them access to some form of therapy."

And now for my question:

What do you think about terminally ill cancer patients and their access to anything that might extend -- or save -- their lives?

Those of us diagnosed with cancer are not the only survivors of our diseases. Our families and friends and caregivers and even employers and co-workers survive right along with us. Sure, the facets of our survivorship vary tremendously -- but we all survive the wrath of cancer in our own unique ways.

My two little boys have spent the past two years surviving breast cancer -- my breast cancer. And while they still don't fully comprehend the magnitude of such a disease, they do understand cancer is a sickness. They understand it took my hair, made me feel sick, left me with scars, and they religiously comment on every pink ribbon they see. They call the ribbons cancer.

I am often asked how my children handled my diagnosis, my treatment, my emotions. They handled it all well, I think, and as time passes, they do better and better. In fact, cancer seems to have vanished into thin air for Joey, who will turn six on Wednesday, and Danny, who is three and a half years old. I know this because of their answers to a few questions I asked them last night, on the eve of 2007.

What was the best thing you did this year?

Joey: Swimming in the pool.
Danny: Being at school.

What was the worst thing that happened this year?

Joey: Getting that boo-boo on my foot, when it scraped on the driveway.
Danny: The cheetah that was chasing me.

What could you have done better this year?

Joey: Learning to ride my bike without training wheels.
Danny: Watching Ice Age.

What would you like to work on during this new year?

Joey: Building a better stick house.
Danny: Drinking milk.

What was the scariest thing that happened this year?

Joey: When I thought there were monsters in my room.
Danny: When there was a cheetah in my room.

What was the funniest thing that happened to you this year?

Joey: When Jack (uncle) and Bud (grandpa) tickled me.
Danny: When the cheetah was chasing me.

When I say the word Daddy, what do you think about?

Joey: Someone who makes me laugh.
Danny: no reply -- he was distracted by the movie Ice Age.

When I say the word Mommy, what do you think about?

Joey: I don't know.
Danny: no reply -- still distracted by the movie Ice Age.

What do you wish for 2007?

Joey: I wish I could fly.
Danny: I wish I could slide on a sleigh.

And that's a wrap. Not one mention of cancer. Not one response concerning endless medical appointments, my drastically different hair, or the port -- they called it a stone -- that was removed from my body in September.

There truly are more important things in life than cancer for two little boys whose memories of a horrible disease will hopefully fade with each passing year -- until not even a pink ribbon catches their attention.

Happy 2007, Joey and Danny. May all your wishes come true!

I am in a slump. I feel tired and slow and unmotivated. And ever since October 14 -- when I ran in the 5K Making Strides Against Breast Cancer event -- I can't seem to find the inspiration to exercise. I am making myself do it -- here and there -- but my usual drive and push and spunk are missing. Typically, I crave exercise and feel lethargic if I don't accomplish some sort of daily physical challenge. But for the past week or so, I have no craving, no desire to walk or run or lift weights, no appetite for my usual fitness routine. I am just plain tired.

Fatigue is a common side effect of cancer treatment -- even years after treatment ends, according to some experts. So perhaps my drop in energy and enthusiasm is due to the cumulative effect of my own treatment for breast cancer that just ended in June. My treatment spanned almost two years. Maybe it's no surprise my body is lagging behind my expectations for physical health.

Experts also say exercise helps combat fatigue. I believe this -- it's why I usually like exercise. It boosts my adrenaline, perks me up, makes me feel alive. If only I could get back into the swing of things, these feelings might come flooding back. But right now, I am not even thinking about how to find my old groove. I am just too tired.

Malignant glioma is the most common primary brain tumor. The outlook for patients with malignant glioma is poor. Median survival for patients with grade III glioma is three to five years and less than one year for the most aggressive form of malignant glioma called glioblastoma multiforme.

The virus or reovirus that the researchers are focusing on is a common virus in humans that inhabits the lungs and intestines. The researchers added that this virus is something that most humans have been exposed to by adulthood but demonstrates no illness or negative effects on us.

When the virus is exposed to the malignant glioma cells it appears to infect and kill the tumor cells. Dr. James M. Markert, M.D., professor and director of the division of neurosurgery at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) and lead investigator of the trial explains "Healthy, non-cancerous cells in our bodies have the ability to prevent the reovirus from replicating, so that even if we are infected with the virus we do not usually exhibit significant symptoms but brain tumor cells do not have that protection, due to a mutation in their DNA. The reovirus replicates, destroying the tumor cell, and the replicated virus goes in search of new tumor cells to infect". So not only will the main tumor be destroyed but the virus could potentially be effective against glioma cells that have begun to spread away from the primary tumor to other parts of the brain.

The phase one clinical trial will enroll fifteen patients that have recurrent malignant glioma. The patients will have a brain surgery procedure that infuses the reovirus through two catheters that are placed on the tumor mass.

The main purpose of this study is to determine whether the virus is safe to administer to humans. It has shown in previous studies to be well tolerated and not have any negative side effects. This research sounds very exciting to me since this disease is very hard to treat. I know too well, as my uncle was diagnosed with a brain tumor and died just over a year from diagnoses before he turned forty. This was in 1987. The prognosis since that time really hasn't changed for malignant glioma. I hope this is something that can give the patients diagnosed much more hope of a longer survival.

Four-time Iditarod champion Susan Butcher died Saturday of complications from a recent bone marrow transplant. Her health concerns began three years ago when she was diagnosed with polycythemia vera -- a rare disease that causes bone marrow to produce excess blood. Then last winter, she was diagnosed with leukemia. Her subsequent bone marrow transplant on May 16 cleared her system of cancer. But she developed graft-versus-host disease -- where transplanted cells start attacking the digestive system. A fever, a change in her potassium level, and a trip to intensive care prompted her husband to write on his blog Friday of her condition. He reported that if she remained stable, she would return to her previous hospital room and would work on recovering. But sadly, Butcher did not recover.

Butcher dominated the 1,100-mile sled-dog race from Anchorage to Nome in the late 1980s and brought national attention to the grueling competition. She won the 1986 race and became the second female champion -- and then won again in 1987, 1988, and 1990. She finished in the top four through 1993. Butcher also made headlines in 1979 when she helped drive the first sled-dog team to the 20,320-foot summit of Mount McKinley -- the highest peak in North America.

Butcher, who ran her last Iditarod in 1994, grew up in Cambridge, Massachusetts and was married with two daughters -- ages 10 and five. Butcher was 51 years old.

There is still time to register, volunteer or donate for the Avon Walk For Breast Cancer which will take place in several cities across the United States -- Los Angeles, New York, Charlotte, Washington DC, Boston, Chicago, Denver, and San Francisco. This weekend walk that extends over two days and 39 miles will take place as soon as September 2006 in Los Angeles and as late as July 2007 in Denver. This walk, designed to benefit medically underserved women and men -- allowing them treatment they otherwise would not receive -- also funds research teams as they continue their quest for a cure. With Prevention magazine as the national sponsor and other official sponsors such as Reebok, the Avon Walk For Breast Cancer has made quite a mark already. This year's Chicago walk raised a record-breaking $8.2 million and tracked the steps of more than 3,500 participants. There is no better proof than this -- in my opinion -- that walking can make quite a difference.

For the almost two years I have been receiving treatment for breast cancer, I have traveled the same path -- over and over and over again -- from my house to the hospital and back again. And while I have seen different doctors and received different treatments and visited various departments and locations for all sorts of surgeries and tests and scans and X-rays, the path has remained the same. And after all the time that has passed, the power of the path has never diminished -- despite how familiar it has become.

Today I drove from my house to the hospital for a counseling appointment. I drove the same stretch of highway for a few miles, got off on my usual exit, drove for a few more miles past all the typical shopping centers and restaurants, and came to the light where I always turn left into the Cancer Center. I drove into the parking lot, found a parking space -- thankfully -- and displayed my yellow patient parking permit that allows to park without fear of a $20 ticket. I got out of my car and began my walk to the main hospital where the psychology clinic is located. I passed -- as usual -- the startling crowds of people smoking outside the Cancer Center, the groups of medical students who gather outside the medical facilities, the masses of people in white coats racing around and checking beepers and talking on cell phones. I entered the hospital, traveled to the ground floor, and turned a few corners until I reached my clinic. I checked in, paid my $25 co-pay, and waited for a just a few minutes until I was greeted by my counselor. We walked to a private room, talked for an hour, and then I followed my path in reverse.

The path is always the same. It is routine and predictable and rarely varies. But it has never become dull and I have never become numb to it -- because the power that is wrapped up in my drive and my subsequent steps that take me to and from my destinations still has a tight hold on me. I can travel the same path for other purposes -- to shop or have dinner -- and the power is lost. But when I travel for reasons all about cancer, the power overwhelms me. It happened today -- as I drove listening to the same CD I always play on these missions, as tears filled my eyes. I was not sad -- just overflowing with emotion. Emotion about all that I've encountered -- the encounters with fear and dread and total repulsion and the encounters with hope and joy and pure contentment. Today I felt powerful. Simply powerful. Because I have overcome what has faced me so far and because I am still traveling the same road, the same path to ensure my future health and well-being -- which is something I hope to become all too familiar with.

Jeannette, a breast cancer survivor who blogs Two Hands, in addition to being the founder of the Traveling Hope Project, has uploaded the first scanned images of the traveling journals. The Traveling Hope Project began as a conversation between bloggers who maintain cancer blogs, as an idea for creating community journals that will be shared as part of a real world traveling exhibit to bring awareness to the personal life experiences of those touched by cancer. Eventually, copies of the journals will be mass produced and distributed to cancer patients and their families, at no cost. All who have been touched by cancer are invited to contribute to the journals. Be sure to take a visit and see the personal artwork and wonderfully handwritten entries.